Indian news round-up

The Board of Control for Cricket in India's (BCCI) junior team selection committee on Tuesday announced the list of 40 probables. The probables list comprises of 20 under-16 and 20 under-19 cricketers for coaching camps to be held in Kanpur and New Delhi respectively between June 4 and 24.

The probables were selected by the Board's Junior selection committee which comprises Sashikant Khandkar, S Kangralkar, Mahendra Rajdev and Ashish Sinha and is headed by Rajinder Goel.

Cricketers selected for the Under-19 camp in New Delhi: Kashinath Khandvikar (Maharashtra), Dhruv Mohan and Sidharth Verma (Delhi), Gyaneshwar Rao (Andhra Pradesh), M Nathani (Kerala), Sugan Kamath (Goa), Aditya Srikkanth (Tamil Nadu), Sandeep Vij and Manish Kumar (Bihar), Nandlal Mehto (Assam), Arvindhan Dass (Bengal), Vivek Mahajan (Punjab), Shankar Saini (Haryana), Udai Karkera (Mumbai), Krishna Chowge (Gujarat), Rishikesh Parav (Baroda), Adwit Manohar (Vidarbha), Aman Verma and Saijwan Khan (Uttar Pradesh) and Arvind Chauhan (Rajasthan).

Cricketers selected for the Under-16 camp at Kanpur: Swapnoj Thakur (Mumbai), Kiran Adhav (Maharastra), Parthiv Patel (Gujarat), Nikhil Rathod (Saurashtra), Sushil Kumar (New Delhi), Manlik Kohli (Punjab), Paras Dogra (Himachal Pradesh), Gaurav Bhardwaj (Haryana), M Talukedar and Polash Jyoti Dass (Assam), NJ Prakash (Bihar), Gourav Sharma (Bengal), Vishal Khudawla (Tamil Nadu), AT Naidu (Hyderabad), Stuart Binny (Karnataka), Sachin Sethi (Goa), Alind Naidu (Vidarbha), Arvind Mann (Rajasthan), Bhushan Verma (Madhya Pradesh) and Ashraf Ali (Uttar Pradesh).

The secretary of the Mumbai Cricket Association (MCA), Prof Ratnakar Shetty, on Tuesday questioned the exclusion of Vinod Kambli from the Indian team for the forthcoming Asia Cup in Dhaka and even disagreed on the explanation given by the selection committee chairman Borde that he was good only for Test cricket. The selection committee announced the Indian team for the tournament on Monday after the 10 day long preparatory camp in Pune.

In a press release in Mumbai, Shetty said ``If they felt that Kambli was Test material, why was he not given an opportunity in the series against New Zealand and South Africa. It is no secret that Kambli's inclusion was opposed even for Challenger Series and when given an opportunity he scored in that tournament too.''

Shetty said ``The selectors went against the BCCI working committee which met last week and decided to give due importance to domestic cricket,'' and added that Kambli's exclusion defied logic since the left hander had scored enough runs in the Ranji Trophy (866) and the one-day format (600) including the Deodhar Trophy and Challenger series.

The executive secretary of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), Sharad Diwadkar on Tuesday said that the junior team selection committee is to meet soon to finalise the national teams for the forthcoming Asian Cricket Council (ACC) Under-15 tournament to be held in Malaysia from June 8 to 18 and the unofficial World Challenger in England during August.

Speaking to a news agency in Mumbai, Diwadkar said that the date and the venue for the selection of the squad would be announced on a later date. He said ``The eligibility rule for the players in the tournaments is that the selected boys must be under the age of 15 as on September 1, 1999.''

Diwadkar said ``The board has also requested member associations to submit the names of all the under-15 cricketers who participated in the junior tournaments this year.''